Let Us Now Praise Famous Men Analysis

In “Let Us Now Praise Famous Men” the author James Agee and the photographer Walker Evans used both their abilities to attempt a recreation of the conditions for the reader to attempt to have a better understanding. They did this in such a way that James Agee said the pictures could stand independently from the text (Agee and Evans 87). Doing this causes the reader to refrain from making their own visualizations’ of what is being described in the text. Therefore, helps the reader get a clarified idea of the text; When the text and pictures collaborate with one-another. While the pictures stand on their own, pictures can’t stand independently from the text because they give a brief understanding of what the text is about, it helps clarify descriptions
given in the text, and limits personal visualizations of the text. To begin, the pictures can’t stand independently from the text because they give a brief understanding of what the text is about. James Agee seemed like he used the photographs as a very brief, but creative introduction. The ideas that a reader would get from the pictures, would help them have a better understanding of what the author intended in the text. As shown in the text and picture about George Gudgon (Agee and Evans 23,107). Although, the pictures were not intended to be an introduction, the resemblance is obvious due to all the relating information gathered from the pictures that are also in the text (Agee and Evans 22-130). Additionally, pictures help clarify descriptions given in the text. James Agee did not say or even refer to the pictures but as the reader it should become very evident. Every character gets a description from the author and some are more descriptive than the others and that’s when the reader can refer to the pictures to actually get a visual image, since the pictures are before the text when reading the text the reader should be able to have a decent understanding of who the character is and what picture they are in. If a character did not get a long description that gave you enough of an understanding of who they are then you could refer back to the photos to truly get an understanding of that character. One of the characters that did not get a lot of attention in the text was George Gudgon which the picture helped finish the minimal narrative on him (Agee and Evans 23,107). Having such respectable recourses provided by the author helps the readers during the reading process (Agee and Evans 22-130). Furthermore, the way James Agee structured the pictures and the text it causes the reader to limit their own personal imaginings of the details in the text. Doing this causes the reader to have a more focused and clarified version of the text interpreted the way they author intended, leaving personal conceptions to the slightest. For example, The reader would visualize things being described in the text to something they can personally relate to like in the section where the author described the contents on the shelf, the author described them and included the description to help the reader try to entirely understand that at which “he” was looking at, not to something that anyone that did not go through those times could picture (Agee and Evans 52,127). The way the pictures are ordered they almost shadow the text with few and minor deviations (Agee and Evans 22-130). The pictures could be used as a support to the reader for them to entirely understand the text, which is what James Agee’s text and Walker Evan’s photographs implied (Agee and Evans 22-130). While the pictures stand on their own, pictures can’t stand independently from the text because they give a general understanding of the text, clarify descriptions given in the text, and limits personal visualizations made from the text.
The pictures before the text allows the reader to start realizing what the following text is generally going to be about. Even including the pictures gives the reader a sense of security since they have another resource to refer to during the process of reading the text for a visual explanation. Although, the photographs makes you create a visualization referring to them and not to something the reader may have a personal or can even relate to because that is not what the text and the photograph intend on. The pictures collaborate with the text in ways that make them a valuable and very reliable means in which the reader needs to have clarity on the meaning that the text is trying to portray. Skipping the pictures would cause the text to be much more difficult than ever intended even though the text was portrayed by the author as difficult and suggests to the reader that pausing to reflect on the text is much more than a suggestion, hinting that it’s more of a requirement (Agee and Evans
87).